Reading The Lightning Thief
by thaliagrace160
Summary: The Seven of the Prophecy along with Thalia and Nico are sent to Mount Olympus. The only problem is, they've been sent back in time. By none other than Apollo, Hermes, and the Fates. Now, they've got to read the 'Percy Jackson and The Olympians' series and 'The Heroes of Olympus' books so that they can get back to their own time. Rated T for slight language.
1. Chapter 1

**I don't own Percy Jackson or Heroes of Olympus. All rights belong to Rick Riordan. **

**This happens after The Heroes of Olympus books.**

**There is some Percabeth in the later chapters.**

**A/N: Rated T for language. Also, as I was re-reading this, I noticed that the characters, especially Nico, are somewhat OC**

**The past demigods will be underlined. The future demigods will not be underlined. Percy from 1998 will also be underlined.**

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><p>"Mother Rhea always liked you best!"<p>

"I am simply stunning!"

"Shut up, and don't call me sis!"

"My master bolt _easily_ tops your trident!"

"You people need to eat more cereal!"

"Everyone just be quiet!" Everyone turned and looked at Hestia with surprise. They had never heard her use such a loud tone before.

Suddenly, they heard screaming coming from above them. All the gods looked up and saw eight kids falling. They landed in a heap on the floor. They stood up. Six of the kids looked about 16 or 17. The other two kids looked like they were around 12 or 13.

"Hey, where are we?" A boy with messy black hair asked.

"I don't know where we're at, Percy. Why don't you ask Nico?" A girl with short black hair said annoyed.

"Nico, what did you do now?" The boy with messy black hair looked at a boy with really pale skin.

"I didn't do anything! I haven't really been able to shadowtravel since Solace made me stay in the infirmary for three days" He threw his hands up dramatically. A girl with curly, caramel colored hair started to laugh while a boy with blonde hair stood by and watched with the other three kids.

"WHO ARE YOU, AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?" someone yelled. The demigods all turned around to look at fourteen gods looking at them. The demigods were standing in Olympus in the middle of the throne room.

"Um, Father, don't you remember us?" the girl with short black hair asked.

"No, now who are you?" he said. Said girl and the boy with messy black hair looked at each other worried.

"You mean you **didn't** summon us here?" said boy asked.

Poseidon looked at the boy with messy black hair. He looked familiar. _He looks like Percy. That can't be though; Percy is only 5 years old._

"No. Now who are you?"

"Lord Zeus, what year is it?" The boy with pale skin asked.

"It is June 21st, 1998."

"Percy, we traveled back in time." he whispered to the boy next to him.

Then, a bunch of little demigods fell on the floor in a big pile. They looked about 11 or 12. They stood up and looked around.

Suddenly, a box dropped on one of the boys' head. "OW! What the Hades!"

Hades scowled at that comment. "Please don't use my name like that, young demigod." The boy nodded.

The blonde boy looked down and saw a bunch of books and a note. He picked up the note and read, _Dear Gods and future demigods, I have sent you back in time to read about Percy Jackson's adventures. The demigods will introduce themselves and say who their parents are. Zeus, you are not allowed to kill or harm them in any way, Love, your favorite gods ever, future Apollo and Hermes. PS, we also sent the young demigods versions of all of you, except for Percy, from 2005 to listen to listen. And Percy will feel all feelings that the book Percy feels. _

One of them stepped forward. "Well, I suppose we should introduce ourselves. I'm Percy Jackson, Savior of Olympus, son of Poseidon and Hero of Olympus." Zeus looked at Poseidon angrily.

"Thalia Grace, daughter of Zeus and First Lieutenant to Artemis." Zeus looked shocked. Artemis looked equally shocked.

"What happened to Zoe?" Artemis asked.

"Nico Di Angelo, King of Ghosts, Ambassador of Pluto, and son of Hades." Zeus looked at Hades and got off his throne.

"POSEIDON! HADES! YOU BROKE THE OATH!" Zeus thundered. Lightning flashed next to him and thunder rumbled through out the throne room.

"You did too, Zeus!" Poseidon yelled. He stood up and a whirlpool started next to him. "So don't try that 'I'm innocent and my brothers get the blame' shit with me!"

Hades stood up with black fire coming out of his hands and off his clothes. "I didn't break the freaking oath! Nico and Bianca were born before it!"

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning hit Zeus and knocked him down, a giant wave hit Poseidon right in the face, and Hades got hit in the face with a black, flaming bone.

"STOP IT!" Thalia, Nico and Percy screamed. "POSEIDON! HADES! YOU BROKE THE OATH!" Thalia yelled at Percy.

"You did too, Zeus! So don't try that 'I'm innocent and my brothers get the blame' shit with me!" Percy shrieked at Thalia.

"I didn't break the freaking oath! Nico and Bianca were born before it!" Nico screamed at both of them.

"Does it really matter if any of you broke the oath?" Percy yelled. After they stopped yelling at their dads, Thalia was glowing and sparks were flying off her hands, Percy was right next to a giant whirlpool and Nico had somehow lit himself on fire, and the fire was black.

"Now you know how FUCKING STUPID YOU ALL LOOK!" Percy and Thalia yelled.

The gods mumbled something and sat back down. The whirlpool disappeared, Thalia stopped glowing, and the black fire around Nico vanished.

The other two kids looked uncomfortable. Percy whispered something to one of the girls, and she stepped forward.

"Annabeth Chase, Architect of Olympus, Hero of Olympus, and daughter of Athena."

The girl with curly caramel hair stepped forward. "Hazel Levesque, centurion of the Fifth Cohort, Hero of Olympus, one of the Seven and daughter of Pluto."

The blonde boy stepped up. "Jason Grace, previous Praetor of the First Legion Legion, champion of Juno, Hero of Olympus, one of the Seven, and son of Jupiter."

The big, burly Chinese boy stepped forward. "Frank Zhang, Legacy of Poseidon, Praetor of the Twelfth Legion, Hero of Olympus, one of the Seven, and son of Mars.

The girl with braided hair stepped forward. "Piper McLean, Hero of Olympus, one of the Seven, and daughter of Aphrodite."

Finally, the short Hispanic boy stepped forward. He puffed out his chest and said, "Leo Valdez, Hero of Olympus, one of the Seven, Hot Stuff, Bad Boy, Super-sized McShizzle-"

"Don't forget Repair boy." Piper chimed in.

"Hush it, Beauty Queen. Anyway, Super-sized McShizzle, and son of Hephaestus." Leo said.

The gods were confused. "Why are there Romans with Greeks?" Athena asked. The demigods looked at each other.

Percy said nervously, "It's a long story. The books will eventually explain everything, Lady Athena."

Zeus looked at the younger demigods. "Now, who are all of you?"

They stepped up and introduced themselves one by one.

"Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena."

"Travis Stoll, son of Hermes."

"Connor Stoll, son of Hermes."

"Clarisse La Rue, daughter of Ares."

"Katie Gardner, daughter of Demeter."

"Silena Beauregard, daughter of Aphrodite." Thalia, Percy, Annabeth, and Nico winced.

"Charles Beckendorf, son of Hephaestus." Thalia, Percy, Annabeth, and Nico winced again. Athena wondered what was wrong.

"What are the names of the books?" Thalia asked.

"Um..." Frank picked up one of the books. "Percy Jackson and Olympians: The Lightning Thief, Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters, Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse, Percy Jackson and the Battle of the Labyrinth, and Percy Jackson and the Last Olympian. I think we should go ahead and start reading."

"Fine, who wants to read first?" Percy asked.

"I will!" Leo said.

**"****I ****Accidentally** **Vaporize My Algebra Teacher"** Leo read.

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><p>Sorry that this chapter is sort of short. I lost my first version of this, so I had to come back and redo most of it. Please review :)<p> 


	2. I Accidentally Vaporize My Teacher

**Disclaimer: I own none of this, sadly.**

**A/N: The characters, especially Nico, are kind of OC.**

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><p><strong>"I Accidentally Vaporize My Algebra Teacher," <strong>Leo read.

"Wait a minute, how do you accidentally vaporize someone?" Athena asked.

Nico shrugged. "With Percy, you never really know." he said.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

"No demigod does, child." Athena said sadly.

**If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is:**

"Percy giving advice, that's unthinkable!" Thalia and Nico screamed.

"Why?" asked Annabeth.

Thalia said, "If Percy's got an idea or giving out advice, MY advice is to run and hide."

**Close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom and dad told your birth and try to lead a normal life.**

"That's not going to work." Annabeth said.

"I know that now, Wise Girl."

**Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"Yeah, you would definitely come close to getting killed painfully, especially if you were Percy." Nico said.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened. **

**But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before ****_they_**** sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

**Don't say I didn't warn you.**

"But you didn't warn me about anything!" Nico yelled.

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

"No, really, Perce?" Jason said, acting surprised. "I had no idea."

"Oh shut it, Grace."

**I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

**Am I a troubled kid?**

"YES!" Thalia and Nico yelled.

"Thanks guys." Percy said.

**Yeah. You could say that.**

"See, you even admit to being troubled." Apollo said.

**I could start at any point in my short, miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan-twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

**I know-it sounds like torture.**

Annabeth, Annabeth, and Athena looked slightly shocked at that statement.

**Most Yancy field trips were.**

"That turned out to be interesting, though." Percy said.

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.**

**Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

"WHAT! You sleep in class?!" Athena shrieked. Percy just shrugged.

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped for once I wouldn't get in trouble.**

**Boy, was I wrong.**

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.**

"Percy, what were you aiming at?" Travis and Connor said between laughs.

"I'm not really sure. I think that I just wanted to see what it would do. It seemed like a really good idea at the time." Percy said which caused the Stoll's to laugh even harder.

**And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

**This trip, I was determined to be good.**

"Like THAT could happen." Nico said. Percy glared at him.

**All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when got frustrated.**

**He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth-grader with acne and the start of a wimpy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled.**

**He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly, brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation.**

"Don't let that stop you!" Ares yelled. Aphrodite glared at him, and he instantly shut up.

**The headmaster had threatened me with death-**

"WHAT?" Poseidon yelled.

**By in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

"Oh." Poseidon said, embarrassed.

**"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."**

**He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

**"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled back to my seat.**

"There's Grover for you, always looking out for people." Thalia said, smiling.

**"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."**

**Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

"What are you about to get yourself into?" Katie asked.

"The book will explain it." Percy said.

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.**

**He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

**It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

Artemis looked at Percy. "It has survived longer than that." she said.

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot tall stone column with big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a ****_stele_****, for a girl about our age.**

"Hold on, weren't sphinx in Ancient Egypt?" Nico asked, confused.

"Well, they were a lot of places; they were just used the most in Ancient Egypt." Annabeth told him. He nodded like he understood.

**He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting,**

"Percy actually thought something from Ancient Greece was INTERESTING?" Thalia and Nico yelled at the same time. Percy glared at them and they started laughing.

"Hey, Nico, come over here buddy. I got something to show you." Percy said. Nico cautiously walked over to him and Percy threw his arm around Nico's neck. Nico started trying to get Percy's arm off his neck, but after a few minutes of unsuccessfully trying to escape Percy's hold, he just gave up. "Say one more witty comment and you're going off Olympus the hard way. Got that Nico?" Nico nodded. Percy let him go.

**But everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

**Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

"She's definitely a monster." Travis said. Travis had been so quiet; everyone had completely forgotten that he was even there.

**From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn.**

"No, that's Nico!" Thalia said and started to laugh when Nico glared at her.

**She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

**One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.**

**Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy about the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you ****_shut up_****?"**

**It came out louder than I meant it to.**

"I don't think I've ever heard you whisper, Seaweed Brain." Thalia told Percy. He just laughed.

**The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

**"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"**

"She is so busted!" Travis and Connor yelled at the same time.

**My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."**

**Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele.**

**"Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

**I looked at the carving, and felt a rush of relief, because I actually recognized. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

"It HAD to be THAT one didn't it?" Hera and Demeter said at the same time.

**"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because…"**

**"Well…" I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"**

"GOD?" Zeus thundered. "Brother, I'm sure that Chiron will correct him." Hades said.

**"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

"See, he corrected the boy." Hades told Zeus.

**"Titan," I corrected myself. "And… he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead."**

"You have to be pretty stupid to mistake a rock for a kid." Connor said.

"Well, Zeus DID have a distinct likeness to a rock as a child." Hera said.

"No, I did not! Now stop telling people that I looked like a rock!" Zeus complained.

**"And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"**

**"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"Try BEING there." Hestia said.

**"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

**Some snickers from the group.**

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

**"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

"Busted." Nico said.

**"Busted," Grover muttered.**

"I think like a satyr! No!" Nico screamed. He threw himself to the floor dramatically. Everyone started laughing. He got back up and Leo continued reading.

**"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

**I thought about his question and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

"Well, he'd better learn the answer… ungrateful demigod." Hera said.

"Hello, I'm right here!" Percy yelled. Everyone else was trying to hold back laughter.

**"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy not, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

Hera, Demeter, and Hestia looked like they were going to be sick.

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.**

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

**I knew that was coming.**

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go-intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

**"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

**"About the Titans?"**

**"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

**"Oh."**

**"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you Percy Jackson."**

"Typical Chiron, he only expects the best out of people." Nico muttered.

**I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament day, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshiped.**

"Even _I_ couldn't do that." Zeus said. Poseidon, Hades, and Hestia nodded in agreement.

**"But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No-he didn't expect me to be ****_asgood_****; he expected me to be ****_better_****. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"He probably was." Thalia said.

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue. **

**Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York State had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, and wildfires from lighting strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from ****_that_**** school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make elsewhere.**

"Percy, you are NOT a loser freak." Thalia said. Percy smiled. "Thanks Thals."

**"Detention?" Grover asked.**

**"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius."**

"You got that right." Annabeth said.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

**I didn't much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home.**

Aphrodite, Demeter, and Hera all cooed at that statement. "You must really love your mother." Hera said.

**She'd hug me and be glad to be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me. **

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramps. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair,**

"Hey, kind of like a motorized café table." Thalia said.

**Making it look like a motorized café table.**

"I think like a Seaweed Brain!" Thalia yelled dramatically.

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I guess she's gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch on Grover's lap.**

**"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"I will NEVER think about Cheetos the same way EVER AGAIN." Apollo said.

"I won't either, Apollo." Hermes agreed.

**I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"**

**"-the water-"**

**"-like it grabbed her-"**

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester.**

"You pretty much just did kelp for brains." Thalia and Annabeth said at the same time.

**"Now, honey-"**

**"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

"Percy, you broke rule 13!" Hermes complained.

"What's rule 13, Lord Hermes?" Percy asked.

"Never guess your punishment!" Hermes wailed.

"I'm sorry, Lord Hermes. Wait, you have a list of rules?" Percy said. Travis and Connor nodded.

"Dad has a whole _book_ actually." Connor said.

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

**"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

**"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. ****_I_**** pushed her."**

**I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to over for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

**She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

**"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood."**

"Well, at least he tried to help you, Perce." Nico said.

**"But-"**

**"You-****_will_****-stay-here."**

**Grover looked at me desperately.**

**"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

**"Honey," Mrs. Dodds baked at me. ****_"Now."_**

**Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

**I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

"I bet it's not as good as mine." Ares said.

"You want to make that a bet, Ares?" Percy said. Ares nodded and glared at him. Percy glared right back at him, and Ares started to whimper a little.

"Okay punk, you win." he said once Percy stopped staring at him. Percy smirked in victory.

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

**How'd she get there so fast?**

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and next thing I know I've something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank piece behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

"It's not the ADHD, son." Poseidon said quietly.

**I wasn't so sure.**

**I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

**Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building at the end of the entrance hall.**

"That's not creepy at all." Hazel said quietly.

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

**But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back into the Greek and Roman section.**

**Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

"That is a definite sign that she's a monster." Thalia said.

**Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it…**

"She probably DID want to pulverize it." Hades and Nico said at the same time.

**"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

**I did the safe thing, I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

"Well, at least we know that Percy can use manners." Nico, Thalia, and Annabeth said at the same time.

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think that you would get away with it?"**

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

**I said, "I'll-I'll try harder, ma'am."**

**Thunder shook the building.**

**"We are not fools, Percy Jackson." Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

"So, how much pain was he going to be in if he didn't confess, and what in Hades is she talking about?" Travis asked. Hades glared at him. "I'm sorry, Lord Hades." Travis said quietly.

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

"Oh no! I think like Percy!" Travis screamed dramatically and grinned at Percy.

**All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room.**

At the mention of candy, Apollo, Hermes, and the Stoll's started to drool.

Artemis chucked a few candy bars at their faces and they stopped drooling when the candy hit them.

**Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on ****_Tom Sawyer_**** from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"The book is actually not that bad." Annabeth said.

**"Well?" she demanded.**

**"Ma'am, I don't…"**

**"Your time is up," she hissed.**

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her finger stretched into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"HADES! YOU SENT A FURY AFTER MY SON!" Poseidon yelled. "You sent a fury after my son." He said quieter. Percy walked over to him and put a hand on Poseidon's shoulder.

"Dad, it's okay. I'm right here and I'm fine." He told Poseidon. Poseidon nodded.

"Perseus Jackson, how could you not tell that your first monster was a fury?" Thalia yelled with a murderous look on her face. Percy slowly backed up from Thalia. Nico, Jason, Hazel and Annabeth understood why he was backing away from her. She had blue sparks flying from her hands.

A bolt of lightning hit the ground next to Percy and he yelped. Everyone but Thalia looked at Zeus. He was confused.

"I didn't do it!" He said. Everyone looked back at Thalia. She was standing perfectly still with her fists still clenched at her sides, but she was still glaring daggers at Percy. If looks could kill, Percy would've been dead. Finally she sat back down next to Nico, and Percy sat next to Annabeth. Leo continued reading.

**Then things got even stranger.**

"How can things get any stranger?" Travis and Connor asked. Hermes and Apollo shrugged.

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

**"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

"What ho?" Travis asked.

**Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

**With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

**My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

"Wimp." Ares and Clarisse both muttered. Poseidon drenched Ares with cold water while Percy drenched Clarisse with cold water.

**She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

**And she flew straight at me.**

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

"That came naturally to you before you knew who you were?" Annabeth asked.

Percy nodded and Jason said, "Percy is a really good swordsman."

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. ****_Hisss!_**

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

The young demigods shuddered. Annabeth remembered fighting monsters with Luke and Thalia and shuddered once again at the thought.

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

**Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.**

**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

"Really Prissy? You thought your lunch was contaminated with magic mushrooms?" Clarisse asked.

"You would have too, Clarisse. I thought that I was going crazy. Besides, I was twelve when this happened." Percy said.

**Had I imagined the whole thing?**

**I went back outside.**

**It had started to rain.**

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

"Who?" Poseidon asked.

**I said, "Who?"**

Poseidon smiled.

"Like father, like son," Athena muttered.

**"Our ****_teacher_****. Duh!"**

**I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

**She just rolled her eyes and turned away. I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

**He said, "Who?"**

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

**"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

"Someone is going to have to teach that satyr how to lie." Hermes said.

"Hermes, you are NOT going to teach any of my satyrs how to lie." Dionysus said.

**Thunder boomed overhead.**

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

**I went over to him.**

**He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

**I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

**"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

**"The other chaperone, Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

**He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"**

"Now, Chiron can lie!" Hermes said happily.

Artemis shook her head. _Boys are so immature,_ she thought.

"That's the end of the chapter. Who wants to read next?" Leo asked.

"I will." Demeter said.

**"Three Old Ladies Knit the Socks of Death" **Demeter read.

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><p><strong>Well, that's end of this chapter. I'd like to add in a couple of other demigods, but I don't know if that would be too much or not. Please review and let me know whether I should add in anybody else.<strong>


	3. Three Old Ladies Knit The Socks Of Death

**Disclaimer: I still don't own anything; it all belongs to Rick Riordan.**

**A/N: I think that I'm going to bring Chiron and Katie into the next chapter and then I'll bring in Sally and young Thalia when they're going to read the fourth chapter. Once again, characters are a little OC.**

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><p>"<strong>Three Old Ladies Knit the Socks of Death<strong>." Demeter read.

"Really Percy? The 'socks of death'?" Annabeth asked.

"Hey, I didn't write the book.

**I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle.**

"A lot of things are more than you can handle." Thalia said and grinned. Percy glared at her.

**For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr-a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip-had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

**Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

"That's because you are Seaweed Brain." Nico said.

"Just how many times has my pyschoness saved your asses?" Percy said.

"More times than I care to admit," Nico muttered.

**It got so I almost believed them-Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

**Almost.**

**But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

"Connor, remind me when we back to camp that we need to teach Grover how to lie." Travis said.

"You are NOT going to be corrupting my satyrs!" Dionysus yelled.

**Something was going on. Something _had_ happened at the museum.**

**I didn't have much time to think about during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

"You're a wimp, Jackson." Ares sneered. Percy and Poseidon both doused him in ice cold water yet again.

**The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic.**

Everyone looked at Poseidon. "Don't look at me. I don't know what happened to cause that."

**I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from D's to F's. I got into more fights with fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

**Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

"An old sot is a fool." Annabeth said, matter-factually.

**The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

**Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

**I was homesick.**

**I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side**

Aphrodite, Demeter and Hera cooed once more.

**Even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

Percy scowled when Gabe was mentioned. Thalia and Nico wondered what was wrong. They knew that Percy hated his old stepdad, but they wondered what made him scowl like that.

**And yet . . . there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was little strange. I worried how he'd survive next year without me.**

**I'd miss Latin class, too-Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

**As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.**

"Chiron can make anyone believe almost anything after a while." Travis said.

**The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the _Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology_ across my dorm room.**

"You threw a book?" Athena nearly shrieked. She looked at Percy as if she kind of wanted to murder him.

**Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.**

"Now you know the difference, though." Hazel said.

**I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.**

**I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. _I will only accept the best from you, Percy Jackson._**

**I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

**I'd never asked a teacher for help before. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

**I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor.**

**I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said ". . . worried about Percy, sir."**

**I froze.**

**I'm not usually an eavesdropper,**

"Whatever, Percy. You always eavesdrop on me and Annabeth every time I come to camp." Thalia said.

Percy grinned. "Hey, it's not my fault you guys go to the beach every time you come to camp, Thals. It's also not my fault that my cabin just so happens to be right next to the beach."

"You eavesdrop all you can." Thalia said.

Percy scoffed. "Whatever, Thals."

**But I dare you to try not listening if you hear you best friend talking about you to an adult.**

**I inched closer.**

**". . . alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the _school_! Now that we know for sure, and _they_ know too-"**

**"We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

**"But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline-"**

**"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."**

"It looks like Percy's _still_ enjoying his ignorance." Nico said.

**"Sir, he _saw_ her . . ."**

**"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

**"Sir, I . . . I can't fail in my duties again," Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."**

**"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall-"**

**The mythology book dropped out of my hand and fell on the floor with a thud.**

"You never give away your position, Percy!" Hermes wailed.

"I'm sorry, Lord Hermes." Percy said.

**Mr. Brunner went silent.**

**My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.**

**A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

**I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

**A few seconds later I heard a slow _clip-clop-clop_, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, and then moved on.**

**A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

**Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

**"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn…"**

**"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

**"Don't remind me."**

**The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.**

**I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.**

**Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.**

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all** night.

"That faker!" Travis and Connor yelled.

**"Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

**I didn't answer.**

**"You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

**"Just . . . tired."**

**I turned so he couldn't read my expression, and started getting ready for bed.**

"That won't work with satyrs." Dionysus said. Everyone looked at Dionysus slightly shocked. Everybody had nearly forgotten that he was there.

**I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing.**

**But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was some kind of danger.**

**The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside.**

**For a moment, I was worried about he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

**"Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's . . . it's for the best."**

"That doesn't sound awful at all." Jason said.

**His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips.**

"Who wants to join the 'Let's-go-punch-Nancy-Bobofit-in-the-face' club?" Leo said. Most of the other demigods raised their hands. "Okay! Let's go do this!" Leo yelled excitedly.

**I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

**"I mean . . ." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

**My eyes stung.**

**Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was me I was destined to get kicked out.**

"I don't think that he was saying that, Percy." Annabeth said.

"Well, I know that now."

**"Right," I said trembling.**

**"No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say . . . you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be-"**

**"Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me."**

**"Percy-"**

**But I was already gone.**

"I probably should have stayed and heard him out at least." Percy said.

**On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

**The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were _rich_ juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

"Yeah, you're from a family of nobodies all right." Apollo said sarcastically.

**They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

**What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spending my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

**"Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool."**

**They went back to their conversation like I'd never existed.**

**The only person I dreaded saying goodbye to was Grover, but it turned out I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

"Creeper much?" Apollo and Hermes said at the same time. They looked at each other and laughed.

Artemis and Athena looked at each other, nodded, and got off their thrones. Artemis hit Apollo upside the head multiple times while Athena punched Hermes in the arm several times. When they were finally done, the goddesses sat back down and motioned for Demeter to keep reading.

**During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something to happen. Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

**Finally I couldn't stand it anymore.**

**I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

**Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha-what do you mean?"**

**I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

**Grover's eye twitched. "How much did you hear?"**

**"Oh . . . not much. What's the summer solstice deadline?"**

**He winced. "Look, Percy . . . I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers . . ."**

**"Grover-"**

**"And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and…"**

"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar." Thalia said.

**"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

"I think like Seaweed Brain!" Thalia yelled dramatically. Percy punched her in the arm and she glared at him. She punched him back.

**His ears turned pink.**

**From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer."**

**The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes, but I finally made out something like:**

**Grover Underwood**

**Keeper**

**Half-Blood Hill**

**Long Island, New York**

**(800)-009-0009**

"I hate those cards." all the demigods muttered. Dionysus smiled smugly.

**"What's Half-"**

**"Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um . . . summer address."**

**My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

**"Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

**He nodded. "Or . . . or if you need me."**

**"Why would I need you?"**

**It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

**Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I-I kind of have to protect you."**

**I stared at him.**

**All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me. And here he was acting like he was the one who defended _me_.**

**"Grover," I said. "What exactly are you protecting me from?"**

**There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs. The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

Poseidon got a bad feeling at that moment. He met eyes with Athena, and she nodded. She had confirmed his fears. His son was about to see the Fates.

**After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

**We were on a stretch of country road-no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

Annabeth finally realized that Percy was about to meet the Fates too. She was worried about what happen to Percy. She kind of liked him.

**The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of bloodred cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice. There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen.**

**I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.**

**All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.**

**The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

Now Thalia was really worried. Annabeth looked next to her and saw Thalia and Nico were really pale. Nico was usually pale, but he was paler than normal.

She put a hand on Nico's shoulder. They met eyes. They didn't speak, but Nico's eyes were asking, '_What's going to happen to Percy?'_ Annabeth honestly didn't know. Percy was a really nice guy. She was worried about him too.

**I looked at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

**"Grover?" I said. "Hey, man-"**

**"Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

**"Yeah. Weird, huh?" You think those socks would fit me?"**

"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all." Annabeth and Thalia said.

**"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

Nobody laughed at the fact that Annabeth and Thalia had just quoted Grover without knowing what he was going to say.

**The old lady in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors-gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.**

**"We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

**"What?" I said. "It's a thousand degrees in there."**

**"Come on!" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back.**

**Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that _snip_ across four lanes of traffic. Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for-Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

"PERSEUS POSEIDON JACKSON!" Thalia shrieked (AN: I'm totally guessing at his middle name. I always thought that maybe it would be Poseidon). Percy flinched when she used his real full name.

"YOU SAW THE FATES AND YOU. DIDN'T. TELL. ME?!" Thalia screamed. With every word, she took a step closer to Percy. She looked like she was about to murder him.

"Now, Thalia, let's not get hasty. I never told you guys because it never really came up in any of our conversations." he said.

"You mean that Annabeth doesn't know about this either? Dude, she's gonna kill you when she finds out." Nico said laughing.

Thalia lunged at Percy and he scrambled off the bench trying to get out of her reach. She grabbed him and pinned him to the floor. She was sitting on his stomach with her left forearm against his chest and she held her hunting knife in her right hand against his neck.

Hazel, Jason and Nico just watched, because they all knew that if they messed with Thalia when she was beating someone up, they'd get injured too.

"How . . . could . . . you . . . not . . . tell . . . me . . . this!" Thalia shrieked. With every word, she punched Percy in the arm with the hand that wasn't holding the hunting knife. Finally she calmed down and got up. She sat back down next to Nico.

**At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the metal compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.**

**The passengers cheered.**

**"Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!"**

**Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu.**

Thalia looked over at Percy. She put her hand on his arm, and he looked at her. Poseidon met eyes with Thalia, and she could tell that the god was worried about his son.

"I . . . I'll be okay, Thals. I just need some fresh air." Percy muttered. He got up and walked out of the room. Thalia looked at Nico, got up and followed him. Demeter continued to read.

**Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

**"Grover?"**

**"Yeah?"**

**"What are you not telling me?"**

**He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see at the fruit stand?"**

**"You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like . . . Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

**His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

**"The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

**He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost-older.**

**He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

**"Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal.**

**"This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

**"What last time?"**

**"Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

**"Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?"**

**"Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

**This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

**"Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

**No answer.**

**"Grover-that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

**He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"That's the end of the chapter." Demeter said.

"That's a horrible way to end the chapter!" Jason yelled.

"Jason, calm down. Gods, you're acting like a fangirl." Piper said.

"Well they can't just leave us on a cliffhanger like that!" he said exasperated.

"It will be fine." his girlfriend said, trying to calm down the frantic son of Zeus.

"It won't be fine, Pipes!" Jason said, flipping around so that his head was hanging off of the couch and his feet hung over the back.

Demeter looked around. "Who would like to read next?"

Hazel raised her hand. "I will."

Demeter handed her the book and she opened it to where the goddess had left off.

"**Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants**." she read.


	4. Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants

**Disclaimer: Sadly, I still don't own any of this. All rights, characters, and story lines belong to Uncle Rick.**

**I just wanted to say, thank you to all of you guys that have read this story and followed it, reviewed, and favorited it. Hope you guys like this chapter**

**I'm adding young Thalia and Sally into the next chapter.**

* * *

><p>"<strong>Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants<strong>." Hazel read.

"That really is an awful chapter title, Percy." a familiar voice said from the doorway. Everyone looked over and saw Chiron and Katie Gardner.

"Chiron, what are you doing here?" Percy asked.

"I suppose that Apollo and Hermes saw it fit to send me here." the centaur said, clopping over to stand by the couch that held most of the younger demigods.

"Katie, what about you?" Annabeth asked.

Katie shrugged and sat down next to Annabeth. "I have no idea. One minute, I was in the strawberry fields yelling at Travis for yet another one of his stupid pranks and then, _POOF!_ I'm standing in Mount Olympus."

"Well," Chiron said. "You should continue reading, Hazel." Hazel nodded and started reading.

**Confession time: I ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal.**

**I know, I know. It was rude.**

"Yeah, it was kind of rude, Seaweed Brain." Annabeth teased.

"Hey, he's starting to freak me out by that point." Percy said.

**But Grover was freaking me out, looking at me like I was a dead man, muttering, "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to sixth grade?"**

**Whenever he got upset, Grover's bladder acted up, so I wasn't surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I got my suitcase, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown.**

"Why would you ditch him like that, Perce?" Travis said. "You're never supposed to ditch your friends."

"Once again, Travis, he was freaking me out and I just wanted to get back to my mom's apartment." Percy said.

**East One-hundred-and-fourth and First," I told the driver.**

**A word about my mother, before you meet her.**

"Amazing," Annabeth said.

"Wonderful," Thalia said.

"Great," Nico said.

"Best mom ever." Percy said.

**Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world, which just proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. Her own parents died in a plane crash when she was five,**

Thalia and Jason-still upside down-both glared at their father.

**And she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for a college with a good creative-writing program. Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma.**

"That's awful, Percy." Annabeth said so quietly that only Percy could hear her.

**The only good break she ever got was meeting my dad.**

Everyone looked up at Poseidon and he smiled at the thought of Sally. "She was a queen among mortals." he muttered to himself.

**I don't have any memories of him, just this sort of warm glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile. My mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad. She has no pictures.**

**See, they weren't married. She told me he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret.**

"Yeah, I bet it was. It must have been a really well-kept secret." Apollo scoffed.

**Lost at sea, my mom told me. Not dead. Lost at sea.**

**She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high school diploma, and raised me on her own.**

"That must have been pretty hard, doing all of that by herself," Katie said. "I can't imagine doing that."

**She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid.**

**Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano, who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world-class jerk. When I was young, I nicknamed him Smelly Gabe. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts.**

Everyone shuddered at the description of Gabe. Aphrodite looked about ready to faint.

**Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along . . . well, when I came home is a good example.**

**I walked into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet.**

"Now that sounds _really_ gross." Frank said, speaking for the first time in a while.

**Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home."**

**"Where's my mom?"**

**"Working," he said. "You got any cash?"**

**That was it. No "Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months?"**

**Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift-store clothes. He had about three hairs on his head, all combed over his bald scalp, as if that him handsome or something.**

Now Aphrodite looked very close to throwing up. "THAT man is revolting." she squeaked out.

**He managed the Electronics Mega-Mart in Queen, but he stayed home most of the time. I don't know why he hadn't been fired long before. He just kept on collecting paychecks, spending the money on cigars that made me nauseous, and on beer, of course. Always beer. Whenever I was home, he expected me to provide his gambling funds. He called that our 'guy secret.' Meaning, if I told my mom, he would punch my lights out.**

"He didn't hit you, did he, Percy?" Thalia asked.

Percy didn't answer. "Perseus Jackson, DID. HE HIT. YOU." Thalia asked.

"It's a possibility." Percy said very quietly.

The daughter of Zeus stayed silent, quietly seething and coming up with the best plan that she could use to get back at Gabe Ugliano for hurting her cousin.

**"I don't have any cash," I told him.**

**He raised a greasy eyebrow.**

**Gabe could sniff out money like a bloodhound, which was surprising, since his own smell should've covered up everything else.**

"Why do you think your mother kept him around so long?" Nico said.

**"You took a taxi from the bus station," he said. "Probably paid with a twenty. Got six, seven bucks in change. Somebody expects to live under this roof, he ought to carry his own weight. Am I right, Eddie?"**

**Eddie, the super of the apartment building, looked at me with a twinge of sympathy. "Come on, Gabe," he said. "The kid just got here."**

**"Am I right?" Gabe repeated.**

**Eddie scowled into his bowl of pretzels. The other two guys passed gas in harmony.**

At this, Aphrodite really DID pass out. Percy looked over at Chiron. "Keep reading, Hazel. She will be fine." their mentor said.

**"Fine," I said. I dug a wad of dollars out of my pocket and threw the money on the table. "I hope you lose."**

Dionysus grinned mischievously. "I'll make sure that he loses."

**"Your report card came, brain boy!" he shouted after. "I wouldn't act so snooty!"**

**I slammed the door to my room, which really wasn't my room. During school months, it was Gabe's 'study.' He didn't study anything in there except old car magazines, but he loved shoving my stuff in the closet, leaving his muddy boots on my windowsill, and doing his best to make the place smell like his nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer.**

Some of the young demigods shuddered and Silena looked like she was about to throw up.

"Percy, how did you live in that place?" she asked.

Percy shook his head. "I'm not really sure."

**I dropped my suitcase on the bed. Home sweet home.**

**Gabe's smell was almost worse than the nightmares about Mrs. Dodds, or the sound of that old fruit lady's shears snipping the yarn.**

**But as soon as I thought that, my legs felt weak. I remembered Grover's look of panic-how he'd made me promise I wouldn't go home without him. A sudden chill rolled through me. I felt like someone-something-was looking for me right now, maybe pounding its way up the stairs, growing long, horrible talons.**

"There probably was a monster searching for you." Katie said.

**Then I heard my mom's voice. "Percy?"**

Leo cracked up laughing. "Dude, you thought your mom was going to be a monster?"

"I was still freaked out, Leo. Now be quiet."

**She opened the bedroom door, and my fears melted.**

**My mother can make me feel good just by walking into the room. Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad. I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Gabe.**

"Your mother, Percy, sounds like a lovely woman."

"She is."

**"Oh, Percy." She hugged me tight. "I can't believe it. You'e grown since Christmas!"**

**Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central. She'd brought me a huge bag of 'free samples,' the way she always did when I came home.**

**We sat together on the edge of the bed. While I attacked the blueberry sour strings, she ran her hand through my hair and demanded to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She didn't mention anything about my getting expelled. She didn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right?**

"Of course he's doing all right. He only nearly got sliced to ribbons by a Fury and he _only_ saw three old ladies knitting the socks of death." Nico said sarcastically.

**I told her she was smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her.**

**From the other room, Gabe yelled, "Hey, Sally-how about some bean dip, huh?"**

**I gritted my teeth.**

**My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire, not to some jerk like Gabe.**

"Or to a god!" Travis and Connor yelled loudly.

**For her sake, I tried to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I told her I was too down about the expulsion. I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends**

"I pretty much only had Grover." Percy muttered.

**I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as bad as the headmaster said. I liked Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convinced myself. I started choking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner. Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly didn't seem so bad.**

**Until that trip to the museum . . .**

**"What?" my mom asked. Her eyes tugged at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?"**

"TELL HER ABOUT MRS. DODDS!" most of the demigods yelled.

**"No, Mom."**

**I felt bad lying.**

"You should feel bad about that." Thalia said.

**I wanted to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I thought it would be stupid.**

**She pursed her lips. She knew I was holding back, but she didn't push me.**

**"I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach."**

**My eyes widened. "Montauk?"**

**"Three nights-same cabin."**

**"When?"**

**She smiled. "As soon as I get changed."**

**I couldn't believe it. My mom and I hadn't been to Montauk the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money.**

"That guy just needs to fall off a cliff or something." Thalia growled. She looked at Percy. "Can I kill that guy?"

"That won't help much."

**Gabe appeared in the doorway and growled, "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?"**

**I wanted to punch him,**

"DO IT!" all of the demigods, along with some of the gods, yelled.

**but I met my mom's eyes and I understood she was offering me a deal: be nice to Gabe for a little while. Just until she was ready to leave for Montauk. Then we would get out of here.**

**"I was on my way, honey," she told Gabe. "We were just talking about the trip."**

**Gabe's eyes got small. "The trip? You mean you were serious about that?"**

**"I knew it," I muttered. "He won't let us go."**

**"Of course he will," my mom said evenly. "Your stepfather is just worried about money. That's all. Besides," she added. "Gabriel won't have to settle for bean dip. I'll make him enough seven-layer dip for the whole weekend. Guacamole. Sour cream. The works."**

"As if he needs to eat even more." Annabeth muttered.

**Gabe softened a bit. "So this money for your trip . . . it comes out of your clothes budget, right?"**

**"Yes, honey," my mother said.**

**"And you won't take my car anywhere but there and back."**

**"We'll be very careful."**

**Gabe scratched his double chin. "Maybe if you hurry with that seven-layer dip . . . And maybe if the kid apologizes for interrupting my poker game."**

"He didn't interrupt anything!" Katie exploded.

**Maybe if I kick you in your soft spot, I though. And make you sing soprano for a week.**

**But my mom's eyes warned me not to make him mad.**

**Why did she put up with this guy? I wanted to scream. Why did she care what he thought?**

**"I'm sorry," I muttered. "I'm really sorry I interrupted your incredibly important poker game. Please go back to it right now."**

Leo pretended to wipe a tear from his eye. "Ah, the beauty of sarcasm strikes yet again."

**Gabe's eyes narrowed. His tiny brain was probably trying to detect sarcasm in my statement.**

**"Yeah, whatever," he decided.**

**He went back to his game.**

**"Thank you, Percy," my mom said. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll talk more about . . . whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay?"**

**For a moment, I thought I saw anxiety in her eyes-the same fear I'd seen in Grover during the bus rise-as if my mom too felt an odd chill in the air.**

**But then her smile returned, and I figured I must have been mistaken. She ruffled my hair and went to make Gabe his seven-layer dip.**

**An hour later we were ready to leave.**

**Gabe took a break from his poker game long enough to watch me lug my mom's bags to the car. He kept griping and groaning about losing her cooking-and more important, his '78 Camaro-for the whole weekend.**

**"Not a scratch on this car, brain boy," h warned me as I loaded the last bag.**

"Brain boy? Seriously? That is an awful nickname." Annabeth grumbled.

"If it makes you feel better, I definitely prefer being called Seaweed Brain." Percy said, smiling slightly.

She lightly nudged his arm. "Whatever, Seaweed Brain."

**Like I'd be the one driving. I was twelve. But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame me.**

**Watching him lumber back toward the apartment building, I got so mad I did something I can't explain. As Gabe reached the doorway, I made the hand gesture I'd seen Grover make on the bus, a sort of warding-off-evil gesture, a clawed hand over my heart, then a shoving movement toward Gabe. The screen door slammed shut so hard it whacked him in the butt and sent him flying up the staircase as if he'd been shot from a cannon. Maybe it was just the wind, or some freak accident with the hinges, but I didn't stay long enough to find out.**

**I got in the Camaro and told my mom to step on it.**

"That was probably smart." Jason said.

"Jason, why are you still upside down? You should have passed out or something by now from the blood rushing to your head." Thalia said.

"The feels, Thals." Jason whispered ominously. "The feels . . ."

"Okay . . . Hazel, if you would keep reading." Thalia said. Hazel nodded and continued reading.

**Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken in to the dune. There was always sand the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, and most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.**

Annabeth shuddered at the mention of spiders and Percy put an arm around her shoulders.

**I loved the place.**

**We'd been going there since I was a baby. My mom had been going even longer. She's never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place where she'd met my dad.**

**As we got closer to Montauk, she seemed to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turned the color of the sea.**

**We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine. We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.**

"What's with the blue food?" Piper asked.

"Yeah," Frank said. "I didn't get that."

**I guess I should explain the blue food.**

"Please elaborate." Leo said.

**See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing. They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop. This-along with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano-was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like me.**

Annabeth and Thalia scoffed. "More like an obedience streak." Annabeth said.

**When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough money to quit the candy shop.**

**Eventually, I got up the nerve to ask about what was always on my mind whenever we came to Montauk-my father. Mom's eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them.**

"Everyone likes to hear about their godly parents." Beckendorf said.

**"He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes.**

"You and your dad do look a lot alike." Katie said.

**Mom fished a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud."**

"And I am proud." Poseidon said quietly.

**I wondered how she could say that. What was so great about me? A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of school for the sixth time in six years.**

**"How old was I?" I asked. "I mean . . . when he left?"**

**She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."**

**"But . . . he knew me as a baby."**

**"No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born."**

**I tried to square that with the fact that I seemed to remember . . . something about my father. A warm glow. A smile.**

"You were a lucky one, you have an early memory of your dad." Travis muttered.

**I had always assumed he knew me as a baby. My mom had never said it outright, but still, I'd felt it must be true. Now to be told that he'd never even seen me . . .**

**I felt angry at my father.**

Percy felt slight anger start to boil up in the pit of his stomach.

**Maybe it was stupid, but I resented him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guts to marry my mom. He'd left us, and how we were stuck with Smelly Gabe.**

**"Are you going to send me away again?" I asked her. "To another boarding school?"**

**She pulled a marshmallow from the fire.**

**"I don't know, honey." Her voice was heavy. "I think . . . I think we'll have to do something."**

**"Because you don't want me around?" I regretted the words as soon as they were out.**

"Percy, that's a horrible thing to say!" Katie said.

"I felt horrible afterwards." Percy said.

**My mom's eyes welled with tears. She took my hand, squeezed it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I-I have to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away."**

**Her word reminded me of what Mr. Brunner had said-that it was best for me to leave Yancy.**

Chiron looked down at the ground.

**"Because I'm not normal," I said.**

"Is there really such a thing as normal?" Apollo questioned.

**"You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd finally be safe."**

**"Safe from what?"**

**She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me-all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, some of which I'd tries to forget.**

**During third grad, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.**

Annabeth shuddered and Percy tightened his arm around her. He knew that she didn't particularly like Cyclops after what happened when she was younger.

**Before that-a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I'd somehow managed to strangle to death with my meaty toddler hands.**

"Kind of like Hercules." Jason murmured, still upside down for some odd reason.

**In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move.**

**I knew I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucinations that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword. But I couldn't make myself tell her. I had a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk and I didn't want that.**

"It did end up ending your trip to Montauk, Kelp Head." Thalia said.

**"I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom said. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other, Percy-the place your father wanted to send you. And I just . . . I just can't stand do it."**

**"My father wanted to go to a special school?"**

"It's a camp," Piper said.

**"Not a school," she said softly. "A summer camp."**

**My head was spinning. Why would my dad-who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me born-talk to my mom about a summer camp? And if it was so important, why hadn't she ever mentioned it before?**

**"I'm sorry, Percy," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I-I couldn't send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good."**

**"For good? But if it's only a summer camp . . ."**

"Now it's your second home." Frank said.

**She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry.**

**That night I had a vivid dream.**

"I hate demigod dreams." Leo said, shuddering.

**It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagles wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.**

Everyone looked at Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon. "We didn't do anything." Poseidon said.

**I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion. I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I screamed, No!**

**I woke with a start.**

**Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.**

Zeus held up his hands. "I have no idea what made me so angry."

**With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."**

**I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seemed to have forgotten. Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.**

"What could that be?" Piper muttered to herself. Around the room, everyone else besides Percy was wondering that as well.

**Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice-someone yelling pounding on our cabin door.**

**My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock.**

**Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't . . . he wasn't exactly Grover.**

"What do you mean he wasn't exactly Grover?" Jason asked.

**"Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"**

"Um . . . he wasn't?" Thalia said jokingly.

**My mother looked at me in terror-not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come.**

**"Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"**

**I was frozen, looking at Grover. I couldn't understand what I was seeing.**

"What are you talking about?" Frank asked.

**"_O Zeu kai alloi theoi_!" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you tell her?"**

"What's right behind you?" Jason yelled.

**I was too shocked to register that he'd just cursed in Ancient Greek and I'd understood him perfectly. I was too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten here by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on-and where his legs should be . . . where his legs should be . . .**

"Are what?" Frank nearly yelled.

**My mom looked at me sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "Percy. Tell me now!"**

**I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.**

**She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. Both of you. Go!"**

**Grover ran for the Camaro-but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.**

**Because where his feet should be, there were not feet. There were cloven hooves.**

"That's the end of the chapter." Hazel said. She started preparing herself for another outburst from Jason. Sure enough, yet another outburst came from the son of Jupiter.

"WHAT?! That's an even WORSE way to end the chapter!" Jason yelled and started flailing his arms around, sliding off of the couch in the process.

"Jason, calm-"

"Don't tell me to calm down, Pipes!" Jason yelled from the floor. "I have too many feels right now!"

"Okay," Hazel interrupted. "Who wants to read next?"

Beckendorf raised his hand. "I'll read next." Hazel handed him the book and he opened it to where Hazel had left off.

"**My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting**." he read.

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><p><strong>It took me about a day to write this chapter and I hope you guys like it. Once again, thank you guys so much for reviewing and favoriting and following this story. It means a lot to me and I am so, so happy that you all like it that much. :) ~thaliagrace160<strong>


	5. My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting

**Disclaimer: I own none of this. It all belongs to Uncle Rick.**

**I figured that I'd respond to some of the reviews I've gotten so far so:**

**MeganAnnabethJackson: I'm so glad that you like it that much! I'm happy to know that you would read a book like this by me.**

**DemigodEkat: I'm trying to come up with some Percabeth moments. I'm trying to put it in at the right moment. I'll definitely bring Will in at some point and have Aphrodite fangirling over Solangelo.**

**Operative CG16: I'm doing my best to keep the updates coming and I'll try to update at least once a week.**

**QueenOfHearts143: I know that Annabeth is his girlfriend and I know that she seemingly didn't react to Percy's possible beatings from Gabe but Thalia did. How I see it is that Annabeth is more likely to mask her anger so that it doesn't it look like she's that mad while Thalia is more likely to explode and come up with a plan to murder you. I think Annabeth might get more upset by things in these next few chapters.**

**I'm bring in Sally and young Thalia in. Young Thalia will also be underlined.**

**A/N: I'm sorry if any characters seem OOC. I'm trying my best with them.**

**I hope you guys like this chapter!**

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><p>"<strong>My Mother Teaches Me Bullfighting<strong>," Beckendorf read.

"Bullfighting?" Annabeth questioned.

Percy shrugged. "I don't know."

Before Beckendorf could start reading, however, a bright light flooded the room. When it died out, everyone looked around.

"Mom!" Percy cried happily. He stood and ran over to Sally, who was standing by the door.

"Percy? What are we doing here?" she asked.

"We're reading books that are apparently about my life." Percy said.

"Thalia?" Annabeth asked.

"What?" Thalia asked.

"No, I mean the other Thalia."

"Annie, I'm the only Thalia in the room."

"No, look! There's another you over there!" Annabeth pointed over next to Chiron. Sure enough, there was a young Thalia standing next to the centaur. The young Thalia looked around.

"What am I doing here? I-I was just on Half-Blood Hill, fighting monsters." she said. She looked at Annabeth and nearly stumbled back. "A-Annabeth? But y-you're only seven!"

"You must be from when I was about to be turned into . . ." Thalia shuddered and trailed off.

"Turned into what?" the young Thalia asked.

"I-I'll tell you later." Thalia said.

"So what has happened so far?" Sally asked.

After Percy explained what had happened already, Thalia sat down next to Katie. Sally and Percy sat down on the couch as well and Annabeth motioned for Beckendorf to continue reading.

**We tore through the night along dark country roads. Wind slammed against the Camaro. Rain lashed the windshield. I didn't know my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas.**

**Every time there was a flash of lightning, I looked at Grover sitting next to me in the backseat and I wondered if I'd gone insane,**

"You haven't gone insane, Perce." Nico said, looking over at his cousin.

"I might as well as have."

**or if he was wearing some kind of shag-carpet pants.**

"Are those even a real thing?" Travis asked.

Beckendorf shook his head and continued reading.

**But, no, the smell was one I remembered from kindergarten field trips to the petting zoo-lanolin, like from wool.**

"The smell of wet barnyard animals." Katie said.

**The smell of a wet barnyard animal.**

**All I could think to say was, "So, you and my mom . . . know each other?"**

**Grover's eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. "Not exactly," he said. "I mean, we've never met in person. But she knew I was watching you."**

"CREEPER!" Hermes and Apollo yelled, cracking up laughing.

**"Watching me?"**

**"Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn't faking being your friend," he added hastily. "I _am_ your friend."**

**"Um . . . what _are_ you, exactly?"**

**"That doesn't matter right now."**

**"It doesn't matter? From the waist down, my best friend is a donkey-"**

"Never call a satyr half donkey, Perce." Connor said.

**Grover let out a sharp, throaty "_Blaa-ha-ha_!"**

**I'd heard him make that sound before, but I'd always assumed it was a nervous laugh. Now I realized it was more of an irritated bleat.**

**"Goat!" he cried.**

**"What?"**

**"I'm a goat from the waist down."**

**"You just said it didn't matter."**

**"_Blaa-ha-ha_! There are satyrs who would trample you underhoof for such an insult."**

**"Whoa. Wait. Satyrs. You mean like . . . Mr. Brunner's myths?"**

"How would you like being called a myth?" Zeus asked.

"I-I wouldn't like it that much, I suppose." Percy said.

**"Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a myth, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?"**

**"So you _admit_ there was a Mrs. Dodds?"**

**"Of course."**

**"Then why-"**

**"The less you knew, the fewer monsters you'd attract," Grover said, like that should be perfectly obvious. "We put Mist over the humans' eyes. We hoped you'd think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are."**

**"Who I-wait a minute, what do you mean?"**

**The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail.**

"WHAT'S ON YOUR TRAIL?" Jason yelled. For some reason, he was still on the floor.

"Jason?" Thalia asked. "I-I thought-"

"We'll explain that later too." Thalia said.

**"Percy," my mom said, "there's too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety."**

**"Safety from what? Who's after me?"**

**"Oh, nobody much," Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. "Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions."**

"I have a feeling that that first part was said with a little bit of sarcasm." Leo said, grinning.

**"Grover!"**

**"Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?"**

**I tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, but I couldn't do it. I knew this wasn't a dream. I had no imagination. I could never dream up something this weird.**

"You had a pretty good imagination when you were little, Percy." Sally said, smiling at the memories of the stories her son used to tell her when he was going to bed and _she_ was supposed to be the one telling the bedtime stories to him but he would tell her bedtime stories instead.

**My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hill and PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES signs on white picket fences.**

**"When are you going?" I asked.**

**"The summer camp I told you about." My mother's voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. "The place your father wanted to send you."**

**"The place you didn't want me to go."**

**"Please, dear," my mother begged. "This is hard enough. Try to understand. You're in danger."**

**"Because some old ladies cut yarn."**

"Those weren't old ladies." Annabeth said.

**"Those weren't old ladies," Grover said. "Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means-the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you're about to . . . when someone's about to die."**

**"Whoa. You said 'you.'"**

**"No I didn't. I said 'someone.'"**

**"You meant 'you.' As in _me_."**

**"I meant you, like 'someone.' Not you, _you_."**

"I'm really confused now." Thalia asked.

**"Boys!" my mom said.**

**She pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she'd swerved to avoid a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm.**

"What in Hades is following you?" Jason yelled in exasperation.

**"What was that?" I asked.**

**"We're almost there," my mother said, ignoring my question. "Another mile. Please. Please. Please."**

**I didn't know where there was, but I found myself leaning forward in the car, anticipating, wanting us to arrive.**

**Outside, nothing but rain and darkness-the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island. I thought about Mrs. Dodds and the moment when she'd changed into the thing with pointed teeth and leathery wings. My limbs went numb from delayed shock.**

"Man," Percy said. "I forgot what delayed shock felt like."

**She really _hadn't_ been human. She'd meant to kill me.**

**Then I thought about Mr. Brunner . . . the sword he had thrown me.**

Percy managed to slip his hand inside his pocket where Riptide sat and wrapped his fingers around the small pen.

**Before I could ask Grover about that, the hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling _boom!_, and our car exploded.**

Percy and Sally cried out. A note fluttered down from the ceiling. Annabeth picked it up and read, _Dear Gods and demigods and Sally, we nearly forgot to mention the fact that not only will Percy feel what he feels in the books, but so will everyone else. Have a wonderful reading. Sincerely, Apollo, Hermes, and the Fates._

Annabeth looked up. "I will so kill Apollo and Hermes next time I see them." She motioned for Beckendorf to continue reading.

**I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried, and hosed down all at the same time.**

**I peeled my forehead off the back of the driver's seat and said, "Ow."**

**"Percy!" my mom shouted.**

**"I'm okay . . ."**

**I tried to shake off the daze. I wasn't dead. The car hadn't really exploded. We'd swerved into a ditch. Our driver's side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like a eggshell and rain was pouring in.**

**Lightning. That was the only explanation. We'd been blasted right off the road.**

Everyone looked over at Zeus. "I didn't do anything!" he yelled.

**Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump. "Grover!"**

**He was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of his mouth. I shook his furry hip, thinking, No! Even if you are half barnyard animal, you're my best friend and I don't want you to die!**

**Then he groaned "Food," and I knew there was hope.**

**"Percy," my mother said, "we have to . . ." Her voice faltered.**

**I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl. It was a dark silhouette of a huge guy, like a football player. He seemed to be holding a blanket over his head. His top half was bulky and fuzzy. His upraised hands made it look like he had horns.**

A few gasps echoed throughout the room as a few of the younger demigods realized who the monster was.

**I swallowed hard. "Who is-"**

**"Percy," my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car."**

**My mother threw herself against the driver's-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked desperately at the hole in the roof. It might've been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking.**

**"Climb out the passenger's side!" my mother told me. "Percy-you have to run. Do you see that big tree?"**

**"_What_?"**

**Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, white House Christmas tree-sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill.**

Thalia smiled slightly. "I guess that would be me."

**"That's the property line," my mom said. "Get over that hill and you'll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don't look back. Yell for help. Don't stop until you reach the door."**

**"Mon, you're coming too."**

**Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean.**

**"No!" I shouted. "You _are_ coming with me. Help me carry Grover."**

**"Food!" Grover moaned, a little louder.**

**The man with the blanket on his head kept coming toward us, making his grunting, snorting noises. As he got closer, I realized he _couldn't_ be holding a blanket over his head, because his hands-huge meaty hands-were swinging at his sides. There was no blanket. Meaning the bulky, fuzzy mass that was too big to be his head . . . was his head. And the points that looked like horns . . .**

"Oh my gods!" Annabeth cried. "It's the Minotaur." she said quietly.

**"He doesn't want _us_," my mother told me. "He wants you. Besides, I can't cross the property line."**

**"But . . ."**

**"We don't have time, Percy. Go. Please."**

**I got mad, then-mad at my mother, at Grover the goat, at the thing with horns that was lumbering toward us slowly and deliberately like, like a bull.**

Percy felt a wave of anger course through him, starting from the pit of his stomach and spreading through the rest of his body.

**I climbed across Grover and pushed the door open into the rain. "We're going together. Come on, Mom."**

**"I told you-"**

**"Mom! I am not leaving you. Help me with Grover."**

**I didn't wait for her answer. I scrambled outside, dragging Grover from the car. He was surprisingly light, but I couldn't have carried him very far if my mom hadn't come to my aid.**

**Together, we draped Grover's arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist-high grass.**

**Glancing back, I got my first clear look at the monster. He was seven feet tall, easy, his arms and legs like something from the cover of _Muscle Man_ magazine-bulging biceps and triceps and a bunch of other 'ceps, all stuffed like baseballs under vein-webbed skin. He wore no clothes except underwear-I mean, bright white Fruit of the Looms-which would've looked funny, except that the top half of his body was so scary. Coarse brown hair started at about his belly button and got thicker as it reached his shoulders.**

The feeling of anger left Percy, only to be replaced by a sense of fear that settled deep, deep down in his stomach.

"That's not . . ." Piper said, trailing off.

"It can't be." Leo said.

**His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horn-enormous black-and white horns with points you just couldn't get from an electric sharpener.**

No one laughed at the last sentence. Everyone was waiting to know what happened.

**I recognized the monster, all right. He had been in one of the first stories Mr. Brunner told us. But he couldn't be real.**

**I blinked the rain out of my eyes. "That's-"**

**"Pasiphae's son," my mother said. "I wish I'd known how badly they want to kill you."**

**"But he's the Min-"**

**"Don't say his name," she warned. "Names have power."**

"You bet they do," Nico grumbled.

**The pine tree was still way too far-a hundred yards uphill at least.**

**I glanced behind me again.**

**The bull-man hunched over our car, looking in the windows-or not looking, exactly. More like snuffling, nuzzling. I wasn't sure why he bothered, since we were only about fifty feet away.**

**"Food?" Grover moaned.**

**"Shhh," I told him. "Mom, what's he doing? Doesn't he see us?"**

**"His sight and hearing are terrible," she said. "He goes by smell. But he'll figure out where we are soon enough."**

**As if on cue, the bull-man bellowed in rage. He picked up Gabe's Camaro by the torn roof, the chassis creaking and groaning. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to stop. The gas tank exploded.**

"So that's what that faded black mark on the road is from." Nico said.

**_Not a scratch_****, I remembered Gabe saying.**

**Oops.**

**"Percy," my mom said. "When he sees us, he'll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way-directly sideways. He can't change directions very well once he's charging. Do you understand?"**

**"How do you know all of this?"**

**"I've been worried about an attack for a long time. I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me."**

**"Keeping me near you? But-"**

**Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill.**

**He'd smelled us.**

**The pine tree was only a few more yards, but the hill was getting steeper and slicker, and Grover wasn't getting any lighter.**

"Was that a fat joke towards Grover?" Leo asked.

"Not really," Percy said.

**The bull-man closed in. Another few seconds and he'd be on top of us.**

**My mother must've been exhausted, but she shouldered Grover. "Go, Percy! Separate! Remember what I said."**

**I didn't want to split up, but I had the feeling she was right-it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat.**

**He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest.**

Annabeth couldn't help but squeal a little and bury her face into her boyfriend's side. She felt Percy's arm around her and she knew that he was okay, but it still scared her a little that he had fought against the Minotaur, _that_ soon.

**The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing. So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side.**

**The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, then bellowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, towards my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass.**

**We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother had said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it.**

**The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover.**

**"Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"**

**But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. **

Fear seized Percy's insides and he dreaded the next part-he knew what happened. It had haunted him for days after it had happened.

**She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air.**

Beside Annabeth, Sally looked like she was struggling for air.

**"Mom!"**

**She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!"**

**Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash, and she was simply . . . gone.**

Annabeth buried her face deeper into Percy's side. She didn't like the fact that Sally had been send to the Underworld, practically being held prisoner in the palace by Hades.

**"No!"**

**Anger replaced my fear.**

Anger once again crept into Percy and spread. He had to control himself so that he didn't cause anything to happen.

**Newfound strength burned in my limbs-the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons.**

**The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too.**

**I couldn't allow that.**

**I stripped off my red rain jacket.**

**"Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"**

"Percy, no offense, but you should work on your insults." Hazel said.

"So I've been told."

**"Raaaarrrrr!" The monster turned towards me, shaking his meaty fists.**

**I had an idea-a stupid idea, but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment.**

**But it didn't happen like that.**

"Of course it didn't." Thalia said.

**The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge.**

**Time slowed down.**

**My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off from the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in midair, and landing on his neck.**

Everyone except for Sally and Chiron looked at Percy in amazement. They were all thinking the same exact thing, how was a twelve-year-old demigod with absolutely no training at all able to do that?

**How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out.**

Percy cried out, holding his mouth. The looks changed from amazement to worry in a split second.

"You okay?" Annabeth asked.

"I'm okay, Wise Girl." Percy said.

**The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils.**

**The monster shook himself around and buckled like a rodeo bull. He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only one gear: forward.**

**Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off.**

**"Food!" Grover moaned.**

**The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again, and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel.**

Annabeth laced her fingers with Percy's and gave him a reassuring smile. He smiled faintly back and kissed her lightly on the cheek. Everyone but Poseidon and Sally failed to see the blazing look that Athena shot Percy's way.

**I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then-_snap!_**

**The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock.**

Percy yelled out again. "I really did _not_ want to feel that," he grumbled. Beckendorf looked at him, slightly worried, but after seeing Percy urge him to keep reading, he continued.

**When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife.**

**The monster charged.**

Surprisingly, Travis and Connor shrieked. Everyone looked over at them and they blushed furiously. "Sorry about that," Travis muttered.

"We just weren't expecting it." Connor said.

**Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage.**

**The bull-man roared in agony. He flailed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate-not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart.**

**The monster was gone.**

**The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled like livestock and my knees were shaking.**

Percy stood, albeit shakily, and started to walk towards the doors. "Keep reading, I'm just going t-to go get some fresh air." He walked out of the room and Annabeth got up to follow him. Sally watched and after a moment of silence, she too got up and followed them out of the throne room.

**My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief. I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover, needing my help, so I managed to haul him up and stagger down into the valley, towards the lights of the farmhouse. I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held onto Grover-I wasn't going to let him go.**

Several of the young demigods made sounds that sounded vaguely like crying and Thalia wasn't sure how much longer it would be before _she_ spiraled down into tears.

**The last thing I remember is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's. They both looked down at me and the girl said, "He's the one. He must be."**

**"Silence, Annabeth," the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."**

Beckendorf replaced the bookmark and closed the book. "Who wants to read next?" he managed to croak out. From the hallway, Percy could be heard faintly saying, "I'm so sorry, Mom, I'm so sorry. I could've done something."

Jason held out his hand solemnly and said, "I will." Beckendorf gave Jason the book and Jason opened it.

"**I Play Pinochle With A Horse**," he read.

* * *

><p><strong>I'm so sorry that it took so long to finish this and update, I was just super busy and I kept forgetting to edit this chapter and I'm super sorry. I hope you guys can forgive me for not updating sooner, but I really am trying. Please review and please no flames<strong>

**So, as one of you suggested, I believe that it was DemigodEkat and Vile'sApprentice, I will definitely be bringing in Will into this next chapter so get ready for some freaking adorable Solangelo!~thaliagrace160**


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